


the gentlest, briefest touch

by gnimmish



Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-28
Updated: 2018-04-28
Packaged: 2019-04-29 03:34:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14464095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gnimmish/pseuds/gnimmish
Summary: [Set between GOTG2 and Infinity War, no spoilers for IW]'God. God. Okay. He has to say something to her, doesn’t he? He can’t just sit here feeling like a moron for the rest of the night while his favourite person in the universe sounds like she wants to shrivel up and disappear.'The story of Peter and Gamora's first kiss.





	the gentlest, briefest touch

 Peter is drunk.

Not the _passed out after dancing naked on a stranger’s lawn_ kind of drunk (…what? That happened once. Maybe twice. Okay?) More… _everything’s a little warm and out of focus round the edges, it’s been a long hard day but they saved a whole hospital ship full of sick civilians, and they got paid and they’re all home safe, comfy,cosy and fed and hey life’s pretty sweet what’s there to complain about anyway_ kind of drunk.

Everyone else has gone to bed. Aside from Drax, who is passed out in the Milano’s cockpit.

But he knows that Gamora’s still up, because he can hear her in the cargo bay.

They’ve put down on a nice quiet little moon just off Xandar, mostly farm land and forest, because trailing all the way back to the Quadrant tonight didn't sound all that fun (not compared to getting fuzzy-warm-drunk, anyway) and it’s a balmy summer night outside, the Milano’s cargo bay open to a grassy slope and a dark sky full of stars.

And Gamora is sat in the mouth of the cargo bay, looking up, like she’s searching for something.

“Hey,” he offers, tentatively, sidling in – vaguely looking for that expensive-ass liquor he knows Rocket smuggled on board after stealing it from a Xandari ambassador last month, but also he wants her company. Because ‘late night’ and ‘drunk’ are the pre-requisits for those cosy chats they have sometimes, when she lets her guard down a little and looks at him a little softer than usual, and he’d like some of that right now, for sure.  
  
She doesn’t answer him.

“G’mora,” he prompts, “hey.”

“Hi.”

She still doesn’t look at him. Her gaze is fastened on the sky, and he can’t read her expression at all, which is weird because Peter’s gotten good at reading her lately, really, he has.

He gives up on the liquor and picks up a blanket – it’s a warm enough night but it’s still, you know, _night_. Night time needs blankets.

“You good?” He carefully drapes the blanket around her shoulders, and then sits down next to her.

“Fine.”

She doesn’t look fine. She doesn’t look bad (…she never looks bad). But she doesn’t look fine.

“You sure?”

She looks at him, finally. And she smiles, but it doesn’t reach her eyes. “I’m sure.”

“What’re you looking at, up there?” He tries, and her gaze returns skyward again.

Then she points, at a faint pin prick of light hovering just over the eastern horizon. “That’s Zehoberei.”

“Your home world.”

She nods, slowly. “I just haven’t seen it in a while, you know?”

“Right.”

Peter isn’t sure which of all those glittering specks above them is Earth – or even where in the sky he should look for it; if it’s possible to see it from here at all. It probably isn’t, right?

Gamora is holding her knees to her chest like she needs to hold herself together. He waits for her to say something else, but she doesn't.   
  
“We could visit, if you wanted,” he offers, tentatively, “I mean, just day trip it. See the sights. Show the guys some culture.”

Gamora’s mouth flickers, like she could laugh, though she doesn’t look happy. “No. No, I don’t – I don’t think I could go back there. After everything.”

“Right. Understandable.”

He watches her closely for a moment – the hunch of her shoulders, the delicate tips of her fingers fidgeting the blanket edge, thumb and forefinger pinched together, her mouth a downward purse.

“Hey,” he nudges her, “thought it was my turn to get all angsty over my tragic backstory.”

That gets him a glance, and a smile – small, but real. It’s been months since Ego, since – everything. But when she’s in a funk he likes to bring it up, pretend to be pouty about her hogging all the sadness on the ship. When he acts like a sulky kid it gives her permission to turn exasperated with him and Gamora exasperated is definitely better than Gamora sad.

To that end, he gets up and properly commits himself to finding that stolen Xandarian liquor, because she clearly needs another drink and hey might as well make it the classy stuff.

“I don’t think I can go back, technically,” she tells him, one shot in, screwing up her face at the taste.

“To Zehoberei.”

“Mm.” She looks morose again. “I’m – ”

And she says something that his translator chip can’t put into English – the closest it gets is a static buzz followed by an ancient Uzbek word for ‘sideways’.

“Uh,” he scrunches his nose – that static felt funny, “repeat that?”

His translator chip doesn’t get any closer the second time.

“Yeah, nope, don’t think we have that concept back on Earth,” he gives her an apologetic shrug.

Gamora waves a hand, distracted, worrying at her bottom lip with her teeth. “It means – damaged. Wounded. So put away. One whose damage hurts others, so they have to be put away from others. It’s a term used for a kind of criminal banned from setting foot in large population centres, people who – abuse others, hurt them because they are hurt. People like that are not allowed on Zehoberei soil.”

Peter blinks – something about that idea rankles. “But you’re not – like that.”

“Thanks.” She drinks, straight from the bottle, swigs hard and long. She has two livers, so she has to go pretty hard to get drunk, but she’s also not really a drinker, not compared to the rest of them, and Peter isn't sure he likes seeing her trying to drown her sorrows – he grabs the bottle to steady it.

“Easy.”

“I don’t like this stuff,” she hands it back to him, wiping her mouth.

“Yeah, you sure seam to hate it.”  
  
“Hush.”

He watches her for a moment, as the silence stretches – the deep shadows cast by her eyelashes, the delicate silver traces of the mods in her face, picked out by the starlight above – and he thinks _fuck she's beautiful._  
  
And she must feel his gaze because she averts hers, ducks her head so that her hair is obscuring her face.

“Peter,” her voice is low, “can I ask you something?”

“Anything,” He slides down beside her, propping himself up on his elbows. She’s still huddled over her knees as he stretches his – like maybe if he performs comfort and safety exorbitantly enough, she’ll relax.

She doesn’t speak again for a moment, till Peter thinks maybe she’s changed her mind, and is trying to come up with something funny to fill the quiet with – when she starts again, clearing her throat.

“Why do you – like me?”

Peter frowns. “What?”

“Why do you like me?” She casts him a quizzical look, “you – you really like me. And I don’t… I just. I don’t understand. I guess.”

Oh, wow, he has literally never heard Gamora sound so vulnerable and it is, frankly, more frightening than any bad guy they’ve ever faced. He’d rather pull another dance off against Ronan than have to deal with Gamora sounding so small and sad and lonely for even one more second and jeez suddenly he wishes he was sober.

“Gamora.” He sits up, trying to find something – anything – to say in the face of how raw she is right now. Because God knows he is not _This Guy_. He has never in his life been This Guy – he was raised by a whole ship full of bozos who were diametrically opposed to ever being This Guy. Hell, Drax would do better at dealing with her right now – Drax is incapable of being lame in the face of someone else’s pronounced vulnerability. Drax lives his life in a world of absolutely literal sincerity and truth and that is pretty much the opposite of how Peter navigates…. Anything. Ever. He once heard Drax explaining to Mantis why she is, empirically, the nicest being he has ever met without even once self-consciously deflecting with a dick joke. It’s the weirdest super power ever but it’d be incredibly helpful right now.

God. God. Okay. He has to say something to her, doesn’t he? He can’t just sit here feeling like a moron for the rest of the night while his favourite person in the universe sounds like she wants to shrivel up and disappear.

“I – I don’t know, I just do.” He offers, limply, and fuck knows that that isn’t good enough. “I do, okay? You’re – awesome. You’re smart and tough and funny and you – you somehow always smell great.”

Gamora gasps a hiccup of sad laughter. “You like me for my ability to shower regularly?”  
  
“I mean, it helps.” Peter shrugs.  

 Gamora buries her face in her hands and Peter can’t tell if she’s laughing or if he’s just totally made this worse.

“Gamora,” he reaches for her, a little clumsily, lays a hand on her shoulder, “I don’t think friendships really… really work like that, okay? I don’t think we can just quantify why we like the people we like. Why do you like me? I mean, aside from how incredibly charming and handsome and heroic I am – obviously.”

Gamora snorts.

“Okay, you could sound less sceptical there.” He pokes her shoulder. But she doesn’t seem quite so sad anymore.

She unfolds her knees, at last, pushes her hair off her face.

“I just…” she frowns, trying to find the words, “I sometimes feel I’ve – tricked you all, into… liking me. Wanting me here. I feel as if, if you saw who I truly was…”

“Gamora,” Peter shakes his head, gently – because doesn’t she know? How can she not know? “I've washed your underwear. I don't think there's anything left to know. Everyone feels like that sometimes.”

“Everyone hasn’t murdered countless innocents on behalf of an unhinged tyrant.”

Okay, fair point. “You were surviving,” Peter tells her, gently, “like the rest of us. You think I’m proud of everything I did growing up with Yondu? You know how much shit I pulled as a kid? I mean – sure, it’s not mass murder, but it’s not…” He can feel himself flailing a little, because jeez he’s been through some ridiculous bullcrap but he cannot imagine what Gamora grew up with. He takes a breath. “If your past bothered me you’d know it. I don’t care who you were. I care who you are now. And now – you’re like… my favourite person in the whole galaxy. Probably. Definitely my favourite Guardian. Just – don’t tell the others.”

Gamora’s mouth twitches, like she’s trying really hard not to smile. “Peter…”

“What? It’s true. Really though, don’t tell the others – I’m pretty sure Drax thinks he’s my favourite and he’d be super hurt if he knew.”

Gamora really does smile, then, but she nods, scrubbing at her eyes with one hand.

“So no more talking about why anyone shouldn’t like you,” Peter insists, giving her a quick nudge, “okay? No one gets to insult my best friend, not even you.”

“Okay,” she murmurs, glancing down, just a little self-consciously.

Peter slings an arm around her shoulders, “okay. Good.”

Her weight gives against him for a moment, and he feels the sturdy warmth of her, the lean knots of muscles in her shoulders and the relief of her sigh as she settles tiredly into his side. He thinks, just a little, about kissing the top of her temple. He’d only have to turn his head a couple of inches to do it, she’s tucked up so close to him.

But he doesn’t. They haven't really touched on - _the unspoken thing_ \- since Yondu's funeral; but she's been kinda cosy with him ever since and she seems to have finally stopped beating herself up for now and he doesn't wanna ruin the moment by pushing his dumb luck that she's even remotely comfortable around him. 

And after a moment, she gets stiffly to her feet, peeling herself free of him. He follows her instinctively, dusting himself off.

He can feel her reeling herself back in, regaining some semblance of her usual stern bravado, the easy rock-chick swagger he finds so incredible about her. “Thanks, Peter.”

“Hey, any time.” He shrugs, because he’s totally cool at having witnessed her so small and scared and in need of a hug, sure, absolutely. Didn’t rip his heart out or anything.

She puts her hands to her temples, stretching, her top riding up to reveal a slice of her abdomen – there’s something sheepish in the gesture. She’s still searching for ways to explain herself. “I just… sometimes. You know?”

“Yeah. Yeah. I know.”

“I feel so… like there’s some so wrong with me,” she sighs, and she looks tired, all of a sudden, sapped dry, “like everyone can see it.”

“Oh, baby girl,” Peter says, and he has no idea where that comes from, he’s never called anyone _baby girl_ in his entire life let alone Gamora, but it’s just kinda exactly what he has to call her then? Somehow? The softness of it seems necessary – the only thing he can call her as something in his chest fills with tenderness, “Baby, there’s nothing wrong with you. You are perfect, you understand? I wouldn’t change a thing about you. You – you’re just right. You are just exactly right.”  
  
And he means it, so sincerely he doesn’t know how else to say it – because he really can’t imagine a world where he would change anything about Gamora, can’t imagine thinking she is anything but the absolute pinnacle of whatever she is meant to be.  
  
He’s not sure what response he’s expecting, though the way she looks at him is a whole conversation. Those huge, dark eyes – the way there’s moisture clinging to her lashes that she won’t blink away because then it’ll fall and that will mean she’s crying and she won’t let herself cry, not now; the way her brow furrows and she swallows like she’s trying to hold something down, her chest contracting, her mouth open just a little.

And then she kisses him.

It’s so soft, and so quick, that he barely registers it happening before it’s over. Just the gentlest, briefest touch of her mouth to his, like something melting away.

She doesn’t touch him anywhere else. Holds herself separate from him, because giving another inch would rip the miles clean away, would be too much, too far, too fast.  
  
It’s all she can do, in that moment. That kiss.

And then she turns and hurries away without a word, and Peter’s left alone in the Milano’s cargo bay feeling like someone just set his hair on fire because _what. The fuck. Was that._

**Author's Note:**

> I'm hoping to turn this into a collection of vignettes detailing how Peter and Gamora got from where they were at the end of GOTG2, to where they are at the start of Infinity War - if that appeals, let me know in the comments. :)


End file.
